Yesterday, I took a small plunge and bought the Nikon V1 kit from BH with the 10-30 and 30-110 lenses for $399. It seemed like a decent deal, considering the Nikon USA website had the retail price at $1,150 when it first came out.

Anyways, I was looking through the Nikon Forum on Dpreview, and I'm hoping the video capabilities are on par with the photos I was seeing with this setup. I've got a promo shoot coming up on March 16 and I'm hoping I can get that DSLR look with some nice bokeh footage to combine with my Sony NX5U.

The main reason I got the V1, is because my wife and daugther are going to Hawaii during Spring Break for a school field trip thing, so I figure maybe the cam could pull double duty and provide me with some video footage as well.

Anyone out else there using the Nikon 1 series for video? LOL

$400, that's a pretty good deal... here's the B&H link: Nikon Nikon 1 V1 Mirrorless Digital Camera with 10-30mm


I've been very curious about this camera ever since I saw the debut at PhotoPlus Expo... especially since the Canon EOS M seems to be a bit of a let-down (for me, at least).

Nice camera, but can be bulky for casual holiday use.

Nikon 1 – J1 review (http://www.photo-i.co.uk/2012/01/nikon-1-j1-review/)

I was called to shoot an event last minute yesterday. (called mid-afternoon, and it started at 7:00PM)

After work, I came home and got my gear together, and brought along the new V1 for its first real use.

The event was a presentation on a book tour. Oddly, it was being held at the church I attend, because the Arts Center across the street didn't have enough room to hold the crowd (based on pre-registrations). Anyways, it was in our old sanctuary which was built in like the 50s or something, and has horrific lighting.

I was really impressed with the 30-110 lens in the dim lighting. The VR really worked well and I was shooting at 110mm at F5.6, 1/6-1/10 sec and the motion blur from my unsteady hands was not objectionable given the conditions. I was filming using my NX5 w/ gain at 12db and nearly max zoom from the back of the room. (Love the 20x zoom on that baby for just these kinds of occassions when you need to get in tight and are restricted by space.) I also had my D90 w/ 17-55 2.8 as well, and of course it was great.

Ok, onto the video which is what this is all about. After thepresentation, the reception was across the street. The building is small, all things considered. Later I learned there were 136 people attending and it was a tight squeeze for the most part.

I decided to kind of go stealth and shoot video with my V1 instead of the NX5 because it's so intimidating. The V1 worked like a champ and I just uploaded the video to my computer and am liking what I'm seeing, for a $399 camera. Nice colors, VR working, focus working... not bad. Definately usable in short bits.

I did have one issue, the files are MOV files and CS5 won't recognize them. I had to change the file extension to MPG before it would import them. And that sucked, because I had about 15 clips to change. Not bad, could have been worse I know. So, from a workflow standpoint, that is a minor downer to have to change file names every time.

Not wanting to hijack the D600/800 video camera thread, I'm posting this under the V1 thread.

Today as I was looking through the above mentioned thread, I noticed Sam Renkin mentioned he was impressed with his D600 footage and what I took out of it was he thought it was better than his Sony Z5U. I found that interesting because I found something similar with my Nikon V1 over my Sony NX5U on Saturday.

I didn't really notice it while I was shooting, but when I got back and started looking through what I had shot I was finding that I was actually prefering the clips from the V1 over the NX5.

To me, they looked sharper and just seemed all around to look better.

Unfortunately, I didn't shoot the same stuff to do a direct comparison as I was really just experimenting with the V1 and 30-110 lens again as I did at my last promo shoot.

I think one thing I've narrowed it down to is bokeh. While not great (shooting at ~110 and F5.6) it is certainly better than what I get out of the NX5.

I uploaded an 8 second clip where I did just happen to shoot the same girl getting her make up done.

The first couple seconds shows the room where I was in, and then the following 2 clips were shot from the right hand side, I was standing behind the chairs and other girls. The first clip is the V1, the second clip is the NX5.

The bokeh really helps with the separation from the wall which is just a few feet behind her. I think this is what is really attracting me to the footage from it. I wish I had the F mount adapeter so I could put my 17-55 2.8 on it. That may be an upcoming purchase. Since there's a 2.7x crop factor it would be about like having a 45 to 150mm.

Private Video on Vimeo

The password is "dvinfo"

I realized tonight that maybe one of the reasons that the NX5 footage didn't come out quite as nicely as I remembered when compared to the V1 is because I'm pretty sure I had it running with Active Steadyshot on. And, as I recall that degrades image quality to some degree.

My previous shoot was tripod mounted so I had turned all IS off. I remember clicking through and seeing Active and I think that's what I left it on instead of just the normal IS.